Almost two years later, on Aug.
23, 1925, the German passenger liner Preussen was steaming through
the area west of where the Omar1 had encountered the brilliant bubble patches. An officer of the
watch described what he saw:

"From right
next to the ship and up to the limit of vision, luminous balls rose from the
lower strata of the ocean. Their distances from each other varied from12 to 100 feet. The time interval between appearances
varied between 20 and 30 seconds. The balls seemed to rise with a speed of
about half a yard per second and had an estimated diameter of six inches.
Just below the surface they expanded to a diameter of about half a yard. When
reaching the surface [they] expanded and flattened. It looked as if they were
bursting. The area occupied by such a phantom body was ellipsoid in shape
with a major axis of 6 to 10 feet. The larger ones retained their intense
silvery-greenish luminosity with a shivering motion until we lost sight of
them."